An easement appurtenant—also known as an appurtenant easement, an appendant easement, or a pure easement—is an easement created to benefit another tract of land, with the use of the easement being incident to the ownership of that other tract of land.

An easement appurtenant benefits one tract of land (the dominant estate or tenement) to the detriment or burden of the other tract of land (the servient estate or tenement).

Easements appurtenant are attached to the land (are said to “run with the land”) and are automatically transferred when either the dominant estate or the servient estate is sold or transferred to a new owner.

In Alabama, an easement appurtenant is recognized as a non-possessory right to use another person's land for a specific benefit to the holder's adjacent land. This type of easement is tied to the land itself (dominant estate) rather than an individual, meaning it 'runs with the land' and is automatically transferred to new owners when the land is sold or otherwise conveyed. The easement benefits the dominant estate and imposes a burden on the servient estate. Alabama law requires that for an easement appurtenant to be enforceable, it must be created with clear intent, be used for the benefit of the dominant estate, and the two estates must be adjacent or nearby. The creation of such easements can be through a written agreement, necessity, implication, or prescription. When property with an easement appurtenant is transferred, the easement continues to exist for the benefit of the new owner of the dominant estate, and the new owner of the servient estate continues to bear the burden, unless legally extinguished through methods such as release by the dominant estate, merger of the two estates, or abandonment.